Page 675 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

and twirl his thumbs. Not that he troubled himself to smile
very brightly; he treated their friend on the whole to as va-
cant a countenance as so clever a man could very well wear.
It was indeed a part of Osmond’s cleverness that he could
look consummately uncompromised. His present appear-
ance, however, was not a confession of disappointment; it
was simply a part of Osmond’s habitual system, which was
to be inexpressive exactly in proportion as he was really in-
tent. He had been intent on this prize from the first; but he
had never allowed his eagerness to irradiate his refined face.
He had treated his possible son-in-law as he treated every
one-with an air of being interested in him only for his own
advantage, not for any profit to a person already so gener-
ally, so perfectly provided as Gilbert Osmond. He would
give no sign now of an inward rage which was the result
of a vanished prospect of gain-not the faintest nor subtlest.
Isabel could be sure of that, if it was any satisfaction to her.
Strangely, very strangely, it was a satisfaction; she wished
Lord Warburton to triumph before her husband, and at
the same time she wished her husband to be very superior
before Lord Warburton. Osmond, in his way, was admira-
ble; he had, like their visitor, the advantage of an acquired
habit. It was not that of succeeding, but it was something
almost as good-that of not attempting. As he leaned back
in his place, listening but vaguely to the other’s friendly of-
fers and suppressed explanations if it were only proper to
assume that they were addressed essentially to his wife-he
had at least (since so little else was left him) the comfort of
thinking how well he personally had kept out of it, and how

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